Hundreds of global leaders gathered in the Pacific Northwest this week for the inaugural One Ocean Week Seattle, a maritime conference with dozens of events that brought together company executives, government officials and advocates charting paths toward cleaner shipping, sustainable fishing and ocean conservation.

The conference, organized by Washington Maritime Blue, was anchored by Wednesday’s One Ocean Summit, where leaders from global companies with Seattle ties discussed their climate progress and the challenges of deploying sustainable technologies.

Seattle-based SSA Marine, a global marine terminal operator, has 200 locations worldwide, moving cargo from ships to terminals and onto trains and trucks. The company has carbon emissions targets and is working to shift from gas and diesel to electrical power for the machines moving moving the cargo, but the move requires juggling sometimes competing factors.

“If you have a piece of electrical equipment, you have to think about charging time that’s required in between shifts, and when can you actually fit it in there?” said Meghan Weinman, SSA Marine’s vice president of sustainability. “One of those big pieces of innovation that we really have to think about is the overlay of technology, labor planning, and can it do the job that we need it to do.”

Corvus Energy is a Norwegian clean shipping company with Seattle offices and a manufacturing facility in Bellingham, Wash. The business is helping vessels go electric with its maritime battery technologies, serving ferries, cruise ships, tugs, cranes and fishing boats.

It’s an evolving sector and the company spends up to 15% of its annual revenue on research and development to fine-tune its technology to meet demanding oceanic conditions.

“It is totally different to operate a battery in an EV versus a maritime setting,” said Corvus CEO Fredrik Witte. “For an EV, you’re traveling three, four hours a day, maybe. But in a maritime setting, you’re potentially operating 24/7.”

Seattle’s Trident Seafoods operates fishing boats and onshore production facilities, including the largest seafood processing plant in North America in Akutan, Alaska. While seafood typically has a much lower carbon footprint than beef, pork or dairy, the company wants to reduce the climate impacts associated with its operations.

But Paul Doremus, Trident Seafoods’ vice president of policy and sustainability, pointed to a hard reality: the company competes directly with Russian and Chinese seafood companies that are doing business under less stringent environmental regulations.

He said the seafood sector — “which has been kind of famously fragmented, small, fairly scrappy” — needs to come together to collectively make improvements.

Doremus applauded events like One Ocean Week Seattle for gathering maritime interests to draw attention and capital toward “sustainable use of the ocean for the benefit of local communities, regional and national.”

“I think that’s the next wave,” he said.

Collaboration and innovation

The call for collaboration echoed throughout the One Ocean Summit, which also featured former NOAA Administrator Jane Lubchenco, United Nations officials, and Norway’s ambassador to the U.S.

Washington Lt. Gov. Denny Heck gave a welcome address, highlighting the state’s maritime economy while calling out threats from plastic pollution, undersea noise, and environmental degradation.

“To face these challenges, we will need to develop new technologies and strengthen our institutions,” Heck said. “It will require sustainable fuel storage, habitat restoration, quiet propulsion and so many other inventions and innovations. But more importantly, it will require the dedication and teamwork of thousands of people.”

The message was reinforced by Haakon Vatle, leader of the One Ocean Expedition, which is sailing a 111-year-old Norwegian tall ship across the globe. The ship, named the Statsraad Lehmkuhl, was moored just outside Bell Harbor International Conference Center during the event.

“The role of our ship is to create attention and share knowledge of the crucial role of the ocean for a sustainable future,” Vatle said. “We’re going to use a ship to reduce the gap between science and the public — get the people we need for the ocean we want. We cannot save the ocean alone.”

Editor’s note: GeekWire reporter Lisa Stiffler was the volunteer emcee of the One Ocean Summit.

Aroma is one of the strongest memory triggers in nature. The smell of a certain perfume can remind you instantly of a friend who always wore the same scent. Without realizing it, scent can shift your thinking and transport you into a different state of mind.  Such is the case with the Sunset Blue cannabis strain, which immediately fills the nose with a sharp pine scent.

A true forest flower, breaking open a bud releases sweet fragrances of blueberry and woodland fruits. Mellow and fragrant, this herb provides an excellent alternative to a walk in the woods if you’re stuck inside all day.

The Sunset Blue High

When relaxation is in order, some cannabis strains are better than others. Those who partake in the herb regularly will likely appreciate the smooth and calming experience the Sunset Blue strain offers her consumers. While perhaps a little slow to kick in, a calm relaxation warms the chest and lungs. This sense of physical ease echoes through the limbs, easing away aches and muscle stiffness.

Excellent for winding down, this flower is the type of plant you’d want around after a long day at work. Unlike many cannabis flowers, however, this strain isn’t the type to promote laziness. Instead, the Sunset Blue high provides a blanketing state of calm that makes it easy to find pleasure in the most mundane activities. Fair warning, though: this strain might make it difficult to concentrate. While those feeling energetic may have enough attentive powers to push through tasks with this flower, Sunset Blue would make a better selection for anyone hoping to finish up some evening chores or spend the night posted up with a funny movie, friends, and family.

Strain Background

It’s all about the craft hybrids these days. With a dusted green coloration with hints of purple, it’s easy to see why this strain can quickly garner top-shelf status. A mix of Sunset Sherbet and Blue City Diesel, this decadent flower is a high THC producer, boasting over 23 percent of this compound.

Sunset Sherbet is a contemporary flower that grew in popularity over the course of 2017. A member of the Cookies family line, the plant is a cross between the famous Girl Scout Cookies and Pink Panties. The former is a high-potency hybrid known for its ability to produce both a powerful body relaxation and a strong euphoric emotion. The latter, Pink Panties, is an indica-dominant plant with Kush genetics.

Blue City Diesel is another well-known plant, crossing the Blueberry stain with NYC Diesel. Fragrant, this plant is known to produce a mouth-watering sweet berry taste and aroma. Its offspring, Sunset Blue, is offered by Northwest Cannabis Solutions, the plant is considered an indica-dominant hybrid. Expect a tight bud structure from this plant, with a frosted trichome coating and wily orange pistillate hairs.

Strain Benefits

The cannabis plant is a growing pharmacy. The herb can produce over 400 different phytochemicals, and early science suggests that many of them have medical value. However, thanks to decades of legal restrictions on growing and cultivating the herb, few cannabis compounds have been studied with enough fervor to make meaningful medical claims.

Still, just because they haven’t been found yet doesn’t mean that the benefits consumers describe are not real.

As a high-THC cannabis flower, the Sunset Blue strain may be helpful to those who struggle with nausea, vomiting, and the inability to maintain appetite. Already, synthetic versions of THC are available to some patients battling with these symptoms. This man-made version is available as a pharmaceutical drug. Sunset Blue, however, provides a natural source of the psychoactive compound.

Slightly sedative in nature, Sunset Blue may also be a valuable selection for those searching for a little extra help falling asleep. Relaxing without overpowering the consumer, this strain has a knack for easing consumers into a calm and relaxed state.

Like all high-THC strains, there are a few words of caution before partaking in Sunset Blue. In low to moderate doses, THC has been found to reduce stress and ease anxiety. In larger doses, however, the mind-bending plant compound may actually trigger more stress and discomfort. For best results with Sunset Blue, enjoy this herb in moderation.

Originally published on cannabisaficionado.com.

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The form and size of a herb garden is determined by the interest these plants hold for the individual. It can be a tiny border of commonly used culinary herbs such as mint, parsley, sage and thyme or an elaborate garden designed to house a wide collection of herbs. Many plants could legitimately be included in one of these large […]

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Hello, aspiring Ethical Hackers. In this article, you will learn about the infamous EternalBlue vulnerability and its exploitation. Vulnerability & Impact Exploited by Wannacry ransomware, the EternalBlue vulnerability exists in the Server Message Block (SMB) protocol. Due to improper handling of specially crafted packets by SMB version 1 (SMBV1) of Microsoft windows this vulnerability allows […]

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